Pop DNA

This week we're diving in to the evolution of Taylor Swift, and we've got graphs!

Over the course of her 17-year career, Swift has evolved as an artist and as a public figure, with distinct "eras" emerging in her music and aesthetic. We take a look at her early career as a teen country music artist, her transition to pop, and her deepening explorations and fine-tuning within both genres to find her current adult artistic voice.

Find the timeline and word cloud images we discussed on our Instagram, and maybe hang out a bit.

Further reading:

Data + statistics on the evolution of Taylor Swift

Taylor's code-switching

Breakdown of style aesthetics for each era

We're doing something totally new this month--discussing the works of a musical artist! And who better or more newsworthy to be our inaugural artist but Miss Americana herself, Taylor Swift.

In part 1, we talk about the very recent announcement of Speak Now (Taylor's Version), look briefly at our personal connections with Swift's music, and take a very scientific BuzzFeed quiz to find out which Taylor Swift Era we are (but then we both self-identify as different ones).

We also give an overview of topics we want to explore in more depth in coming episodes, including:

Watch this video from The Take for a great primer on the Taylor Cinematic Universe. Follow us on Instagram for sporadic and sometimes relevant content.

It's Rhonda's Birthday Bonus, so she roped Erin into talking about Twilight! As long-time listeners know, Rhonda is contractually obligated to bring up Twilight at regular intervals, and after this episode her quota will be met for quite some time.

In our scholarly and insightful discussion, we talk about every Twilight consumer's burning question: Team Edward or Team Jacob? We also talk about our personal experiences with the books and movies, theorize about what makes the series so compelling to so many, and even (casually) dip into the literary history connected to Twilight.

We also acknowledge the problems with the series, including racism against Indigenous people and internalized misogyny, and talk about whether we think the recently-announced TV adaptation will be able to sufficiently address those issues.

Further Reading:

Hollywood Reporter article announcing the new TV series

Rhonda's blog post from 2020 reflecting on the series (links to other posts)

A Case Study from Evergreen State College analyzing the Twilight series' portrayal of Indigenous people

Post from the Burke Museum at the University of Washington on cultural theft in Twilight

The Quileute Nation's official website

We wrap up our series on A League of Their Own this week by discussing romance!

Erin gives us a rundown on the documentary A Secret Love, which chronicles the real-life love story of Rockford Peach Terry Donahue and her lifelong partner Patricia Henschel. Then Rhonda deep-dives into the reference made to Pride and Prejudice in the first episode of the show, and how this reference foreshadows or contextualizes the romance storylines.

Further Reading:

We also found this article on parallels with another literary reference, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Follow on Insta and join us next week for Rhonda's Birthday Bonus!

We're continuing our discussion of A League of Their Own with a look inside the real All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) and a few of the real women who played in the league over its 12 seasons. We also analyze how accurately the movie and TV series portrayed the realities of the league.

Check out our recommended reading list below for our sources and further background on the history.

Recommended Reading:

This 2018 Chicago Tribune article offers lots of valuable background

The Hidden Queer History Behind A League of Their Own

Official League profile of the Rockford Peaches

Rockford Peaches official website

LA Times profile of Maybelle Blair

Follow us on Instagram for our current read-and-watch recommendations.

It's officially baseball season and we're celebrating with a deep dive into the 2022 Amazon original series A League of Their Own, and the 1992 movie that inspired it! We open it up with a look at our first experiences with both the film and the series, and then do an overview of what we plan to explore in more depth this month.

Topics include the true history of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League and the real Rockford Peaches, as well as the real-life queer love stories that may have inspired the TV show's romance, plus how references to literary classics like Pride and Prejudice and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn offer parallels to the story, and more.

We also take the quiz to find out which character we are, which you can take here.

Follow along this month and join us on Instagram for some sporadic bonus content.

This week we're very excited to welcome our guest Natania Barron, author of the Arthurian-based Queens of Fate trilogy, to talk about the film The Green Knight, the character of Gawain and his many iterations, nerdy medievalist Easter eggs, the enduring and transcending relevance of Arthuriana, and so much more!

Find Natania and her books on her website and follow her on Twitter, TikTok, and Instagram. Her book Queen of None is still available from some sources, but it will be re-released along with its sequel, Queen of Fury, early next year.

This week in our discussion of The Green Knight, we look into readership and audience reception of the source text, the film, and other recent fantasy fiction. Medieval readers (or listeners) of Sir Gawain's story would have understood references and symbols in the text that many modern readers and viewers miss--what are some of these references?

We also talk about the persistent myth that everyone in Medieval Europe was white, and how this racist myth has affected modern audiences' perceptions of the film's casting choices. This leads into current broader popular culture discussions around the casting of actors of color in other fantasy media, such as House of the Dragon and The Rings of Power.

Further Reading:

Crash course on the source text

L.A. Times reviews of the film

How Gawain's race affects the film

An interview with "Medieval POC"

Race and Worldbuilding in Fantasy

And follow us on Instagram.

We're very excited to be diving in to the 2021 film The Green Knight this month, as well as the 14th century English epic poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight on which the film is based. As an introduction to this series, we discuss our overview thoughts on the movie, plus our experiences with the source text, as well as Arthurian legends in general. 

We also do our usual "table of contents," giving you a taste of the topics we plan to talk about this month. Things like:

Plus, we are going to have a guest this month, and it's a good one! You'll definitely want to tune in for that. Or maybe not, I don't know, I don't know your life.

Go follow us on Instagram if you want very sporadic updates and random thoughts.

Wrapping up our series on To All The Boys, we look at how psychology and long distances affect the relationships in the films as well as in real life.  Erin of course dips into her psychology expertise to talk about the vulnerability cycle in relationships, and how we see this play out especially in Lara Jean and Peter's story. And Rhonda breaks down some of the locations used in the films, from the Pacific Northwest, to Seoul, to NYC, looking at how setting informs the characters and story.

Further Reading: 

The Vulnerability Cycle in human relationships

Filming locations in the movies